In this study, I will discuss about "punctuation mark education." In regard to the punctuation mark education, the focuses of the discussion are: first, middle school students as the subject; second, the contents of the education for the subject. In other words, the purpose is to research proper punctuation mark education contents for middle school students. As regards punctuation mark education that is crucial to understand and to communicate the accurate meanings, I will contemplate theories on the punctuation mark education, and plan the contents of the punctuation mark education by examining curriculum that are standards of the school education, and by researching actual conditions and practice aspects of middle school students’uses of punctuation marks.
Many scholars have pointed out the insufficiency of the regulations of punctuation marks, which are the basis of school education’s practice, and the punctuation mark education that is based on this regulation also has various problems.
First, the punctuation mark education reveals drawbacks of teaching grades. According to the 6th education curriculum and 2007 revised education curriculum, the punctuation mark education is accomplished during 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grades of elementary school and during 3rdgrade of middle school, which is a sophomore year in high school. It is problematic not only because the punctuation mark education is leaned too much towards first three grades of elementary school, but also because in middle school, the punctuation mark education is only conducted as a part of the overall orthography education In addition, the grades that are targeted to teach punctuation mark education, according to the 6th education curriculum and 2007 revised education curriculum, throughout elementary, middle, and high school, in the 6th education curriculum 4 semesters and 4 chapters, in the 7th education curriculum is 3 semesters and 3 chapters, and in the 2007 revised education curriculum is 2 semesters and 2 chapters, therefore, the teaching and learning practice and time has been gradually decreased over time.
Second, the punctuation mark education discloses problems of teaching contents. Although there are differences in punctuation mark education that is conducted in elementary school and in middle school, mostly they are limited to period, comma, and quotation marks ~. That is, in school education curriculum, it is limited to period, question mark, exclamation mark, comma, quotation mark, and accent mark out of 24 punctuation marks that are presented in the regulation of punctuation marks that is considered as denotation educational object; therefore, there are more punctuation marks that are excluded from the education subject than punctuation marks that are learned from the school education that makes it harder to accomplish thorough punctuation mark education. Moreover, the failure to master various kinds of punctuation marks and uses that are presented in the appendix of 1988 "Korean Spelling System" also indicated the limited ability of learning limited functions. The punctuation mark educationdoes not increase and more deepen, as the grade goes up, but it just simply repeats the same contents; therefore, it is hard to say that the punctuation mark education is successfully conducted.
Third, the pronunciation mark education reveals problems in teaching aspects. Punctuation education is taught in reading and writing textbooks of elementary school, and in Korean language knowledge education of middle school. In reading and writing, the punctuation marks are important to deliver words’ accurate meanings. Furthermore,if we consider the importance of the punctuation marks when they play a crucial role as a rhetorical device in literary works, and when they have their own individual meaning from sentences in mass media, it is essential to increase the area of the punctuation mark education to where reflects the actual language practices.
Despite the punctuation mark education plays an important part in terms of completing the meanings and delivering the right meanings, the punctuation mark educationwithin the school education has many problems. Thus, in this study, based on these problems, I will examine middle school students who have been neglected from the punctuation mark education as subject, research problems of teaching contents, and plan contents of punctuation mark education that reflects various aspects of actual language lives.
For this purpose, the research has been conducted in this order:
In Chapter 1, I examined preceding theories on punctuation marks. The following is the direction of preceding theories on punctuation marks:
First is a theoretical study on punctuation mark education: 1. the history of punctuation marks and its diachronic study; 2. compare and contrast of South and North Korean’s punctuation marks; 3. problems of current regulations; fourth, the actual condition of usage.
Second is an educational research on punctuation marks. In this area of study, I am going to narrate by dividing into three parts: 1. an examination of current condition; 2. a plan for teaching structures; 3. the spelling system.
We can find the following distinct characteristics when we gather up the preceding studies:
First, studies on punctuation marks are mostly theoretical researches, while educational research is very insufficient.
Second, theoretical studies on punctuation marks are mostly about analyzing problems of current regulations; and those problems, such as concepts, names, structures, spacing of the words, and a lack of punctuation marks, are found from various usages. Those problems that are found on the regulations and errors of usages can be causes of the incompletion of the current punctuation mark regulations. Therefore, it is inevitable to revise the current punctuation mark regulations, and punctuation mark education that are based on the current regulations that are assumed to be the perfect knowledge needs to be reconsidered.
Third, the educational research on punctuation marks is in a state of inadequacy. Considered that not only elementary school students, but also middle school students’ perception and usages of punctuation marks when the majority of the punctuation mark education is leaned too much toward the earlier grades of elementary school, the need of education is clear, and the punctuation mark education that can be a basis of education for middle school students.
Fourth, although contextual structure of the educational research on punctuation marks are mostly consisted as ‘curriculum analysis to textbook analysis to current condition analysis to teaching structure suggestion’, but it is hard to find the research consistent because it lists individual phenomena rather than analyzing it as a constant structure. Moreover, the teaching structures that have been suggested in order to achieve effectiveness and efficiency at the teaching field are not consistent with the results.
The preceding results show that the researches on the education of punctuation marks need to be more active. Especially, when we look at middle school students’ perceptions and the current usages, the need of punctuation mark education is crucial, yet the research on this area has been neglected.
In the second chapter, I examined theories on the punctuation mark education. First, I looked at the concepts, needs, and structures of the punctuation marks, and divided the punctuation mark education into educational theories and teaching theories. For this research to be accomplished, the concepts of punctuation marks must be set. In "Korean Spelling System" (1988), it examines the concept of the punctuation marks and other concepts that were suggested in the preceding studies. Next, in the educational theories, I examine, including preceding studies on the punctuation mark education, the characteristics of the purpose of the study, the methods of the study, and the purpose of the study. In the teaching theories, I examine the curriculum and the punctuation mark education shown in textbooks based on the sixth education curriculum to revised seventh education curriculum.
In the third chapter, building upon the results of my preliminary survey conducted above, I examine the actual practice of punctuation usage among secondary level students by analyzing writing samples and interviews with students. In this, I utilize and presume the necessity of the concept of punctuation that I introduced in Chapter II; thus, I attempt to observe punctuation usage among students according to the different contexts in which punctuation is used. Currently, institutional education is focused on teaching the precise usage of punctuation in reading and writing as a means to enhance communication skills. However, if we consider theentire scope of language usage, we can perceive that punctuation can have different functions and aspects according to the different contexts of its usage. Thus, in this thesis, I situate punctuation usage as a means for communication largely into three different contexts; the context of everyday communication, the context of literary communication, and the context of web communication. I collect written samples and data from each of these three contexts and examine the different functions and manifestations of punctuation according to each context.
The results of my analysis can be divided largely into two categories: the different functions of punctuation, and the different manifestations of punctuation. In terms of the functions of punctuation: the period, the comma, and the ellipsis were the most frequently used types of punctuation while the middle dot, parantheses, the emphasis symbol, the concealment symbol, and the omission symbol betrayed a tendency towards obsolescence; new forms of punctuation that are not specified in the current punctuation standard such as the angled bracket ‘<>’, the semicolon ‘’, and the underbar ‘_’ were notably observed to be gaining more widespread usage; the usage of the ellipsis, the period, the emdash, the hyphen, and the middle dot, and other types of punctuation were observed to be widely used in altered forms and functions that differed from what they were originally intended for; in the context of web communication, both single and double quotation marks were largelyabsent from usage and often replaced by other forms of punctuation; and finally, because of the distinctiveness of the subjects that were literature majors, punctuation usage in literary contexts rarely displayed erratic usage or usage for rhetorical effect.
In terms of the different manifestations of punctuation, in general, the exclamation point, the question mark, and the ellipsis displayed a strong tendency to be used in multiple form. On the other hand, the middle dot, single and double quotation marks, the emphasis symbol, the concealment symbol, and the omission symbol were rarely used in this way. Moreover, although the use of punctuation symbols in multiple form was widespread in the context of everyday and web communication, it was more prevalent in the context of web communication.
My interview results display that on the cognitive side, students had a low level of awareness regarding the significance of punctuation and its usage, while similarly, their memory of past education regarding punctuation and their actual performance in usage was very poor. Moreover, the interview subjects exhibited signs of distinguishing punctuation usage according to the context of its usage. Therefore, these results demonstrate the necessity for a more systematic and precise punctuation education, and likewise, the need to select different content for punctuation education depending on the different contexts of communication we wish to address.
In the fourth chapter, based on the results reported above, I attempt to present a general framework for the educational content of punctuation. The general approach of my strategy for punctuation education relies upon the results presented in Chapter III regarding the actual usage of punctuation, asserting the general objectives that the content of punctuation education must strive to achieve and attempting to distinguish the educational content in terms of the different contexts of communication we experience in practice. In terms of general objectives, I argue that the essenceand goal of punctuation education should be the factual understanding of the punctuation standard, but also the facilitation of the critical understanding of the various functions of punctuation according to the differing communicational contexts of its usage in practice. Additionally, we must consider whether students are actually well acquainted with all the punctuation symbols and functions mentioned in the punctuation standard and take the variance in their familiarity of the symbols into account in our textbooks. Moreover, since it is common that a single punctuation symbol has several different forms, meanings and functions, and these components can have different manifestations according to the distinct situations and purposes inherent in the various contexts of communication, we must be sensitive to the various usages of punctuation in actual language practice and acknowledge this variety in our educational content.
In regard to the direction that the content of punctuation education must take, I argue that we must take an integrative approach, taking into account language education as a whole, with a special eye towards the continuity and sequential nature of education across different grade levels; also, we must critically examine the validity of the various forms of punctuation across different contexts while aiming to encompass in our educational content both the commonalities and peculiarities of punctuation usage according to each communicational context. In regard to teaching and learning methods and evaluation of punctuation education, we must presume an ‘openness towards variety.’
In sum, based upon my theoretical treatment and research on the actual practice of punctuation usage, I have presented a framework for the content of punctuation education in terms of the ‘context of communication’ and ‘the process of comprehension.’This is because, even though in actual practice, punctuation usage exhibits different functions and manifestations depending on the communicational context, the current educational curriculum and textbooks do not take this into account at all and thus there is a discrepancy between the educational content and the actual language practice of punctuation, failing to consider the interests and desires of students regarding punctuation usage. Through the usage of educational material that reflects the actual language practice of the public, students will be able to comprehend that punctuation usage is different according to the communicational context and discover that punctuation has a wide variety of functions and manifestations. At a point in time when the punctuation standard, which is currently the foundation on which all institutional education is based, has been criticized by several scholars for its shortcomings and thushas been subject to pressing demands for reform, I believe that, in light of the limitations inherent in the realities of punctuation education, being compelled to resort to the transmission, memorization, and usage of imperfect knowledge, this new framework is an educational alternative in that it allows for students themselves to grasp through the process of comprehension, the actual practice of punctuation, thus overcoming the opposing characteristics of punctuation education to be both essential for language but suffering from inadequate specification.